"What is tonight, if it's not a party?" enquires Alan Cumming in the course of his one-man show. Well it could be described as an ego-trip, an exile's return and a song-and-gagfest aided by an eight-piece band. But what struck me forcefully was how engaging Cumming is in the role cheeky-chappie raconteur and how he lapses into showbiz cliches once he starts to warble.

Cumming is a Scottish actor who has made good in the States and much of the evening consists of stories about his life in what he calls "Obamaca." He is very funny about his cultural innocence when he first played Cabaret in New York and found himself telling Jessye Norman "I have one of your albums". Although he has become an American citizen, he retains an outsiderish wariness: the show's sub-title springs from the linguistic naturalisation-test he was obliged to take which, as he says, introduced the idea of consumerism and gas-guzzling. Even if he is now a US citizen, it is revealing that he returned, for his civil marriage, to the UK "where the gay population is treated with respect".

With odd exceptions, I found the 16 songs Cumming sang less interesting than his chat. All too often the songs drone on about love requited or unfulfilled and Cumming himself tends to adopt a posture that seems alien to his natural personality. The truth is that Cumming is a natural comic and I wished he'd give us a few Harry Lauder songs, plus some Coward or Sondheim, to express both his residual Scottishness and his quicksilver wit and charm.